Don't call it a backlash, but The Times profiles some young adults who have pledged to give up Facebook, and what they consider to be its all-consuming "social" universe. One psychologist says she had spoken with dozens of teenagers trying to break the Facebook habit, either by forming their own support groups, by entrusting friends with their passwords, or by -- gasp! -- deactivating their accounts altogether. School officials, meanwhile, are pondering what the school's role should be, since students use Facebook mostly at home, although excessive use can affect their grades. The Times also points out that Facebook doesn't …

Hulu has added the ability to search captions so users can hunt for a keyword in the text of a particular TV show or movie. The joint video venture has also added analytics about which parts of each show are being viewed the most. Fast Company, for one, asks it these new features represent a maneuver to beat Google? While still in beta test mode, the features are fully operational, and let users "search the captions for thousands of videos across hundreds of shows." It's essentially a keyword search function for any show that has closed captions packaged along with …

U.K.-based consumers will soon be able to watch BCC programming with a Web-enabled set-top box. The set-top boxes and supporting software are expected to be available late next year for about $320, and will allow consumers to access various sites such as the corporation's seven day catch up service, iPlayer. The venture -- known as Project Canvas -- would become a leading platform for internet services on television, as the venture's partners include the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Five, plus BT and Carphone Warehouse, the leading broadband providers. The BBC Trust, the corporation's governing body, has been reviewing whether …

Once touted as the future of digital content consumption, 2009 witnessed the continued decline of RSS Readers. "Many of us still use them, but less than we used to," writes ReadWriteWeb, which largely attributes the rise of Twitter for the fall of RSS. Google still dominates what remains of the RSS market, while Bloglines is "hanging in there, but it seems like it's given up the fight judging by lack of activity in its blog and traffic dips." Overall, RSS reading is a very fragmented experience, today, due to the fact that consumers can monitor news and information via Twitter, …

What sort of man walks away from over half a billion dollars, particularly when he operates in an industry notorious for dramatic shifts and spectacularly disruptive developments? The sort of man that is Jeremy Stoppleman, CEO of Yelp, who -- according to TechCrunch, which broke the news Friday that Google's acquisition of the local reviews site was nearly a done deal -- just had a change of heart. "Something happened that made Yelp reconsider the deal," writes an incredulous TechCrunch. "Over the weekend they notified Google that they were not going to sell, say multiple sources." …

You'd think an outfit like the "Iranian Cyber Army" would have better things to do with their time than messing with Twitter users. Yet, it appears as though the micro-blogging service's domain name system records were indeed altered by the group. In other words, would-be Twitterers trying to reach the site directly via name resolution services were thrown over towards a fake domain, even though Twitter itself -- and micro-blogging applications that plug into Twitter's API like TweetDeck -- were unaffected by the attack. "Twitter's DNS records were temporarily compromised tonight but have now been fixed," the Twitter team confirmed …

While Apple has yet to break its exclusive iPhone carrier contract with AT&T, BusinessWeek reports that Verizon is preparing for just such an occurrence. Indeed, Verizon Wireless has already made upgrades that would make its network more capable of handling extra traffic that would be generated by the iPhone. Verizon Wireless officials have in the past said they occasionally discuss partnerships with Apple executives, while, earlier this year, the companies were reportedly considering releasing "iPhone-like devices," which would run on the Verizon Wireless network. To date, Verizon Wireless has beefed up its network through acquisitions, closing a $27 billion deal …

Following a legal challenge by major French publishers, a Paris court has found Google guilty of violating copyright for digitizing books and putting extracts online. The ruling comes after the La Martiniere group, which controls the Editions du Seuil publishing house, argued that publishers and authors were losing out in the latest stage of the digital revolution. La Martiniere, the French Publishers' Association, and authors' groups SGDL argued that scanning books was an act of reproduction that should be paid for, and demanded that the US-based search giant be fined $21.59 million.

In case you were wondering, Don Dodge -- who joined Google in November after being laid off as Microsoft's "engineering evangelist" -- is very happy with his new job. What's he doing differently at Google? "The difference," he tells VentureBeat, is that "at Microsoft my group was focused entirely on startups ... Now I'm doing the same thing, but I'm also talking to small and medium businesses and large enterprises about moving to Gmail, Google Apps, and App Engine." To a startup, what's the difference between Google and Microsoft? "The principle difference," says Dodge, "is that at Microsoft, the software …

Bloomberg explores the steadily growing world of paid content online, made up of publishers and platforms that rose to digital prominence with largely free and ad supported offerings. Among others, LinkedIn Corp., Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN, Skype are now reportedly boosting sales by adding features that customers have to pay for. LinkedIn, for one, recently introduced a product that helps recruiting agencies scour the networking site for job candidates, while ESPN this summer merged its online magazine with its Insider service, which costs $6.95 a month. Skype, meanwhile, has added features such as voice mail and calling plans that allow …